Punggur

This is what it looks like when you come into the little town of Punggur on the coast of West Kalimantan by boat (see String of Pearls and Peat Farmer). Looks like low tide, and you have to climb up a ladder to get into town. I remember that there is a wonderful little "warung kopi", i.e. coffee shop, right on the pier. Strong, hot coffee served in a small glass with lots of sweetened condensed milk. [NOTE: Colors are muddy because the image was scanned from an old slide].

Yonghe Temple II

Another image from the Yonghe temple in Beijing (see Yonghe Temple) showing the lavish painting on the archways and the exquisite metalwork on temple censers. Originally built as an imperial palace during the Qing Dynasty, the sprawling structure was later converted into a Tibetan Buddhist monastery. It is one of the largest and most important Geluk lamaseries in the world. [NOTE: Palms together to Zhiyao Lu for introducing me to this amazing place and waiting patiently as I repeatedly bowed and offered incense (thx, Yao)].

Taking Notes

A peek over the shoulder of one of the participants at a training workshop on sustainable rattan harvesting held at Ban Sobphuan, Laos (see Thin Red Line). Pretty clean notes. Looks like the top graph relates to graphing a running mean to assess the efficiency of sampling operations, while the histogram on the bottom probably refers to something I said about the relationship between plant size and growth. [NOTE: I can tell by the scarf that the man in the black baseball cap shown in the center of the image is Ou Ratanak from WWF Cambodia (see Lunch at Ban Sobphuan)].

View From The Tea Shop (From The Archive)

Spent all day in the car driving back to Hanoi from Central Vietnam.  Every couple of hours we would stop for a cup of tea at one of the numerous little shops along AH 1. The view out the back of the one near Thanh Hoa where we stopped this afternoon is shown above. [NOTE: That's a water buffalo standing out in the field to the left. And that's a dove in the cage upper right. And the bike had a flat tire].

Front Steps

These are what you have to climb up to get into a Tay stilt house in northern Vietnam. I had problems climbing up in full daylight. Can't imagine what it's like to come down in the dark, e.g. if you need to go to the bathroom in the middle of the night. [NOTE: House and steps photographed on the grounds of the Vietnam Museum of Ethnology in Hanoi (see Museé d'Ethnographie du Vietnam)].

Remork-moto

A "remork-moto" is what a large trailer hitched behind a motocycle is called in Cambodia. Similar forms of transportation are called "tuk-tuk" in Laos (see Tuk-tuk to Pha That Luang). They are used throughout rural Cambodia to carry all sorts of things. Even the family livestock. [NOTE: Seen on the road heading back to Siem Reap from Ta Prohm (see Ta Prohm). I miss Cambodia. And traveling with my oldest son (thx, Case)].

Gingko and Bamboo

While taking out the garbage as part of my kitchen chores at the Garrison Institute, I was struck by this colorful grouping of Gingko and bamboo at the back of the main building. Two interesting botanical stories here.

Gingko biloba L. is native to a small area of Zhejiang province in eastern China, and the species was initially thought to be extinct in the wild.  Several specimens, however, were found that had been planted and preserved by Buddhist monks. The innumerable Gingko trees that have been planted throughout the world are all progeny of these few trees. Bows of gratitude to the monks for conserving this germplasm. [NOTES: More on the restricted genetic diversity of "wild" Gingko populations in China and evidence for thousands of years of planting by Buddhist monks can be found here. Fascinating story].  

And then the bamboo. It is estimated that there are over 1600 species of bamboo in the world, over half of which grow in Southeast Asia. Only three species, e.g. Arundinaria gigantea (river cane), A. tecta (switch cane), and A. appalachiana (hill cane), are native to America. Only about 2% of the extensive cane breaks that originally extended over North America are still extant; most fell victim to the plow. [NOTE: The bamboo pictured above is, unfortunately, neither species of Arundinaria. Looks more like a cultivar of Phyllostachys, maybe P. aureosulcata McClure].

View From The Floor

After a day and a half of doing zazen on a hard, kapok zafu, I took a moment on Saturday afternoon to stretch out on the hardwood floor in my room (No. 359) at the Garrison Institute. Did wonders for my back and shoulder muscles. And the view was pretty nice, too. [NOTE: I practice shikantaza, or "just sitting" style zazen and sit cross legged in the Burmese position].

Fall Sesshin 2012

So, I spent the weekend running inventory transects (see Camp Deerpark Forestry), came home and went through one of the most powerful hurricanes to ever strike New York (see Waiting for Sandy and Grace), had a week without lights, or heat, or hot water in the house, and then took off to the Garrision Institute for the EHZC Fall Sesshin.  Three days of intensive meditation, delicious food - and hot showers. Wonderful. [NOTE: Image above shows Roy Staab's bamboo sculpture, Wheel of Time, on the riverfront lawn in front of the Garrision Institute].

Camp Deerpark Forestry

Spent the weekend before Hurricane Sandy up in the Catskills at Camp Deerpark running inventory transects to update the allowable cut calculations in the management plan (see Tree Marking and Elias Drops a White Pine). My crew did 48 plots, i.e. 9,600 square meters of inventory, and had a great two days shuffling through the autumn leaves counting and measuring trees.

Walked by what used to be an old field and saw that it had been turned into a log yard. That's the red Wood Miser portable sawmill in the background. Very proud  of how the Camp has taken to the sustainable forestry concept. Useful example of what a small, faith-based organization can do with 100 hectares of forest. Great job, guys.